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The Rundown!

Puck is a weekly webcomic that, in the words of one fan, is "mostly irreverent humor concerning a pretty girl with freckles and a hot she-devil who wears fan-service costumes." Surreal fantasy slice-of-life crazy-type stuff about the world's funniest redhead! Updates Tuesday.

RIP Project Wonderful

I’m guessing this post will make sense to no one outside of the webcomic world, but I feel the need to recognize the passing of a company that contributed mightily to said webcomic world — a company that has now passed into the ether.

Project Wonderful was an indie ad service that catered almost exclusively to webcomics and blogs. It was started by Ryan North, creator of Dinosaur Comics, and it was brought into existence as a better, nobler concept for an ad platform. It was a great and affordable way for webcomics to spread the word about their art. If you ever saw an ad for Puck, chances are it was through Project Wonderful. I’m guessing most of my readership really came from those ads – either that, or Top Web Comics. But Project Wonderful was key to my formula for getting the word out about Puck.

I’ve been using PW since around 2013, and in those five years, I’ve spent over $10,000 US on ads through them. It’s a lot of coin, but it was always money well spent, and most of that money went to independent webcomic creators who ran PW ads on their sites. Now it’s gone.

Not really sure what I’m going to do from here on in. One of the cornerstones of my webcomic approach has just crumbled. And as Ryan North noted, the whole ‘indie webcomic/blog’ thing is really dying. Indie comics are slowly becoming a thing of the past. Facebook and Instagram try to minimize external links and keep people in their walled gardens. Every month, it gets harder and harder for me to find an audience.

This doesn’t mean the end of Puck, but it does mean that a major support network has ceased to exist for me. Not sure how I’ll progress from here.

Ryan, if you’re out there, I salute you and your spunky chutzpah, sticking up for us little guys and trying to make something cool. You helped me out big. And I thank you and anyone else at Project Wonderful. While it lasted, it was, indeed, wonderful.

Discussion (34) ¬

I’ve seen many Indie comic creators move to Patreon. They still have their public comic, but often produce exclusives for their Patreon backers (single panel jokes, offers to draw patron avatars, etc.).

Well, I’m on Patreon. I have a little support there. Some nice people support me. Not many, but it’s something.

I must clarify that I never put PW ads on my website. I just bought PW ads to publicize and find new readers. So the issue for me now is not monetization. Honestly, money’s never been a big concern of mine because this comic has always been a side hobby. I’ve never dreamed it could support me, and it never ever will.

My issue is that now I have limited avenues to find new readers. Running ads on PW was always a reliable and affordable way of doing so. Now it’s gone.

Sadly, it’s just another nail in the coffin of the webcomic world as it thrashes about in its long, painful death throes. I wish I could be optimistic, but when the numbers only ever go down, it’s hard to keep a happy face on.

There’s many options. But they almost all require time (except the last one) and interest in Patreon from my readers has been really … limited. The people who support me are good folks who just want to drop a dollar my way, and I’m thankful. But I can’t think of anything I could offer that would win over new people. Maybe my readership just isn’t big enough or invested enough. Or (most likely) the comic just isn’t good enough to develop a strong fan base.

Well sir, I thank you for the vote of confidence. To be honest, I think the readers that I have are discerning and intelligent people, and I take that as a good indicator that what I’m making is at least halfway decent. Nevertheless, the comic seems to be less popular with every passing month, and that’s concerning, seeing as it was never very popular to begin with.

The fact that it keeps going, though, is entirely due to stalwart people like yourself who come back consistently, week after week. Thank you.

Well, I think I can personally take some of the blame for you not noticing. I never really do much of a hard sell on Patreon. I’ve always felt a little uncomfortable about that model. Like, if people want to donate some money and get access to a few extra things, that’s cool, but I’ve never liked to beg or get in people’s faces. I know that makes me a bad salesman, but … most creators are bad salesmen. I am, at least.

This is a real shame. Project Wonderful was always a solid, reliable way to attract new readers. It was particularly helpful for creators such as myself, who are unsociable losers and incompetent self-promoters.

You and I are in the same boat, then. As one of the most introverted of introverts, I find it very difficult to be outgoing and make friends. I seem to be even worse at it on the internet. I sort of got the gist of DeviantArt a long time ago, but I’ve never taken to Facebook, or Instagram, or Twitter, or Tumblr, or any of those platforms. Besides, the ‘hot’ platform seems to constantly shift. And without comic friends and cross-promotions, PW was my one avenue for bringing eyeballs in. Not anymore, I guess.

I may need to learn the basics of AdWords. That’s kind of my project over this summer, I guess. Not sure if it can be a valid ad platform for the little guy like us, but it’s worth a shot? Maybe?

It is for me. It’s sadder when you read the description as to why the company folded, because it’s all too accurate a description of the dynamic currently at play on the internet. The idea of independent content creators hosting their own stuff on their own privately owned websites has been dying, mainly because large corporations have realized that such things leave them out of the profit chain. (Large corporations have never been fans of creators making profits.) So they’re doing all they can to end this trend. And they’ve largely succeeded.

It was indeed sad to see P.W. drift into the depths of history… I used them for a while to advertise. (Sadly, attracted no readers, but that’s a story for another day.) When I heard the news about P.W., I instantly thought of Puck.

Yeah, I do think it fixed much of what was broken in the world of internet ads. Too bad no one bothered to emulate their model or back them.

And sadly, I guess it’s money that makes the big difference. I used to run PW ads on my old Smackjeeves site. I made a dollar or two a day. But then I got Adsense, and I could make, like, TEN dollars a day, maybe, and it was hard to say no.

I know there are lots of webcomics out there who only do Patreon and don’t run ads. I also know a bunch of creators who say that they make almost no money on ads, ever, and that Patreon is way better. But that hasn’t been my experience. For me, ads make five times what Patreon brings in. I really don’t like ads, but for me they’ve become a necessary evil.

I’m definitely in the toss (everyone) a buck camp on Patreon (about 85 web comics, youtubers, and software developers altogether.) I think if blogs are dying, it’s partially because people are lazy and only want to go to twitter, etc, and partially because Google basically put the entire RSS industry out of business by undercutting them with Google Reader, then discontinued it, which took a lot of momentum from the ability of people to follow a lot of independent comics and blogs. I still use RSS myself, and really we should try and find a way to push everyone to use it…

That’s it entirely: people are lazy. I’m lazy. There is nothing technically stopping people from finding and reading independent creator content, but if it’s not made easy, then people don’t. And the large corporations have found it’s in their best interests to not make it easy.

85 creators sponsored on Patreon?!? You, friend, are truly awesome. I mean, that’s a bunch of money, but that’s also going to keep the stuff you love going. If more people did that, it would be a very different landscape for creators, certainly.

I remember at one point you were the high bidder at least half of the time during the year and a half or so I had ads on my forums. It was truly the only ad network that actually made enough sense I’d put it on my websites and whitelist it on my uBlock without fearing my AdBlock-less visitors would get those pesky viruses and/or get annoyed. And, as a bonus, it was actually fun seeing my member putting their stuff in the ad box!

Oh well, It’s definitely the end of an era, the decline of indie websites at the profit of social networks. Well, if you still want to “bid” on my ad box like the good ol’ times, you still can do that manually… Might be a good idea, give out a space on the website as an incentive for a donation or a Patreon pledge. Let’s try this out.

I’ve also thought about a simple ad box exchange or something old school like that. But it’s easier said than done if you’re wanting to incorporate thousands of sites like the old PW did. I don’t know. I’ve even thought of the Patreon concept, like you. It’s an idea.

Your votes most definitely help, friend. Other than the ads, the only other way people can discover my comic is through Top Web Comics, and your votes are what keep me not on the bottom. No one’s checking out the comics in the 150th spot. But if I’m in the top 30, some people might notice. And you ensure that.

Hi. I usually never comment, but in this case, I just had to. I have been following Puck for a long time now and I actually took the time to reread it all a couple of weeks ago (it’s that good). Puck is one of the comics I absolutely have to check in on every week. I love the humor, the artistic style, and every single one of your fantastic characters. You should be very very proud of your work! 🙂 Thanks for all the great laughs so far!

I thank you for the vote of confidence. It’s always nice to hear, because as a creator, it’s usually hard to see the good in your own work. I’m at a real low point right now, so to know that someone out there actually likes my stuff, that’s valuable.

This is disturbing that it’s harder to use the WWW to get the word out. Selfishly, I wanted to start some creative projects as I inch toward retirement. As a fellow introvert, I was thinking of web ads as a means to getting word out once I had sufficient finished story content.

Well, internet ads may still be an option. I need to learn the basics of AdWords, the biggest ad platform in the world. I’m scared, but I need to do it.

It is certainly much harder now to be a content creator on the internet unless you’re willing to marry yourself to a platform site. And that has its own list of terrible problems attached to it, as any creator on Youtube can tell you. I prefer being a lone wolf, but the big companies hate lone wolves. They have a nasty way of eating into their enormous profit margins.

Never would have thought to describe my stuff as classic WB animation-like, but it’s a compliment I’ll gladly take. A few years ago, some comedy guys I like noted that the very concept of ‘the joke’ is kind of dying on the internet now. Humor is now often referential or meme-based, but the classic concept of setup, delivery and punch line is almost a quaint thing from the days of yore. I try to keep it alive as much as I can.

I wish I had an intelligent comment to make. Even though I’ve been reading a lot about the history of comics, I really have no idea how comics after the time of Winsor McCay actually made money. I shall have to give this some thought.

Well, McCay and all usually had some form of publication distributing them and paying their way. Though sadly, I believe a lot of them had to hand over copyright for the privilege. Comics have been hit by the same internet-based nightmare that’s hit all print media. People want content for free. Advertisers are wary of internet ads and their efficacy. So the end result is companies providing free content in order to entice the views, but going bankrupt in the process.

There’s a bunch of really great indie people who, thanks to Patreon, have carved out a really solid income. I am not one of them. At all. But they do exist.